A University of Victoria student is overjoyed after being reunited with his scientific gear Friday after it was lost at sea for six months.

PhD student Xavier Muoy was studying how fish communicate with each other through sound with an elaborate instrument he made with PVC pipe, fish-monitoring microphones and a camera.

“They make typically grunty sounds, and they make that most of the time for reproduction, for attracting mates. So very low frequency and very grunty sounds,” said Muoy

He anchored it in Roberts Bay on Jan. 22 to record fish and their sounds for one week, after which Muoy expected to pull it up and find a treasure trove of information.

When he returned to the site, mysteriously his gear was gone. 

He returned the next day with divers to scan the area, but was unable to find anything.

“It is very frustrating," said Muoy at the time. "It’s mostly because that represents a lot of money in equipment, so I will have to find the money to purchase new equipment or even rebuild some of those, like the camera is something I designed myself." 

The intricate contraption he built cost him nearly $10,000 to complete. 

“Losing the equipment was a real bummer,” he said. 

Then, miraculously, something was found by a “very nice lady” on Clover Point beach on Thursday.

Leanne Willmore, who picks up trash and walks her dog on the beach every day, came across the fishy treasure.

The camera she found had a University of Victoria sticker on it, so she called the biology department to let them know she discovered something. She left it where she found it and continued on her way.

However, when Muoy came to the beach to pick it up, it was gone. Lost, found, then lost again. 

Then, after the turmoil of losing his equipment for a second time he received yet another call from Leanne. She said that she had found the camera once more a bit further down the beach while on her trash cleaning conquest.

On Friday, Muoy returned to the beach and was, finally, reunited with his gear.

The camera was found intact, dry and with some recoverable information still on it. 

While he’s happy to have the camera back, it still only constitutes about half the gear that was originally lost.

He is still grateful though.

“I’m amazed by community support. All the people who called saying they might have seen it were extremely supportive,” said Muoy.

He has since got to work on building a new more effective instrument, this time with surface floats and more weights.

The new equipment has been successfully tested twice.